kiss me a question
by quintilis
Summary: When Athrun finally kisses her, it is like waking up from an endless sleep or catching a breath after an underwater dive. It's like an explosion that consumes her and then pieces her back together in shaky fragments. Updated. AxC
1. Chapter 1

**Category:** Gundam SEED

**Disclaimer:** I don't own it.

**Notes:** I am so terrible at writing story summaries. On the other hand, I love AUs so much; somebody _tear me away before I drown myself_. This was inspired by an absolutely gorgeous Jon/Sansa story on AO3. Plus, I just went ahead and marked this as 'incomplete' on FF because I have this crazy urge to write more! Stay tuned.

* * *

She hasn't moved in ten minutes.

Athrun stands in front of the large window to his office, watching Cagalli sit unmoving in the chair in front of his desk. If she only turned her head she could see him, but she hasn't moved her gaze from the map pinned to his wall. The only motion in the room is that of her shoulders, gently rising and falling under her blue coat.

"You should go talk to her," Detective Simmons says, as she passes by with a cup of coffee in her hand. "She's been in there a while, and we don't have anything to do with her."

Athrun chews the side of his mouth uneasily. "There's blood on her coat."

Erica shakes her head. "Not hers. One of the men that was supposed to be guarding her…from what I've heard, it doesn't seem like he'll pull through. Don't tell her that." She takes a sip from her cup. "Christ, this thing is a mess. You've read the report on tonight's shooting."

Mess is an understatement, Athrun thinks. In the year since the Seirans were accused of killing Uzumi Nara Athha, Orb has devolved to a bloody power struggle between the nation's five most powerful families. Parliament has taken full control of the government, and in the meantime, there have been numerous threats, retaliations, and schemes between the royal families. All of them crossing about eight different jurisdictions.

"But why is she here?" Athrun stresses. "National Police is covering the whole disaster. Our hands are tied unless someone from the state has actually ordered Intelligence to get in on this."

"She asked to be brought to you."

Athrun lifts his head suddenly. "What?"

Erica begins to walk away. "She obviously can't go back home tonight. When they asked her where she'd want to stay, somewhere she'd feel safe, she said she'd like to go to Athrun Zala." With a shrug, Erica vanishes around the corner.

Athrun sighs. He doesn't know how Cagalli thinks that he can help her, but he understands the sentiment. She doesn't have anyone left whom she can trust.

When Athrun opens the door to his office, Cagalli finally moves, shifting to acknowledge him over her shoulder.

"Good evening, Athrun," she says as he comes to stand behind his desk. Her voice is strained.

It's strange, being this close to her. He hasn't seen her in years, can barely remember the last time they spoke. Cagalli looks different and the same all at once: face slimmer, neck longer, eyes sharper. She so resembles Kira from the last he saw him that Athrun has to close his eyes and press a hand to his temple.

Most days Athrun tries not to think of Kira and how he disappeared over six months ago. There hasn't been even a hint of a trail to trace him by. But it's hard to forget, when he still works at the Federal Investigation Agency, a job that Kira helped him get back when he had first left PLANT. And it's harder still when Kira's sister is sitting inches away from where he stands, hair bright and tumbling over her shoulders in an entrancing shower of golden.

"Are you okay?" Athrun asks, mouth dry. It's a stupid question.

Cagalli frowns and twists her hands in her lap. "Passable. Have you heard anything about the condition of my bodyguard Ichiro? He was taken to the hospital."

Athrun studies her, her back rigid and expression tight. "Er…no. I'll look into it for you."

Cagalli doesn't look at him directly. Maybe she's already caught onto his lie. In the dim overhead light, she is beautiful; beautiful and tragic. Athrun chews the inside of his mouth again, apprehensive. Her entire body is tense, as if she expects him to throw her out. He wishes she would calm down.

As Athrun leans over to reach a desk drawer, his blazer falls open to reveal the handgun tucked into his waistband. He sees Cagalli's line of sight drop there and she pales further. Athrun doesn't want to linger on that revelation.

"Here," He shakes the battered box of Marlboros in his hand to offer her a cigarette.

She takes one and places it between her lips. Athrun extends his arm to give her the lighter, and there's an awkward pause. Cagalli raises her amber eyes to his pointedly. He feels suddenly faltering and inept.

"Sorry," Athrun mumbles. He comes around the desk to light the cigarette for her. The moment the lighter sparks, with a soft noise, she glances up at him again. Her gaze cuts straight through him like a sharp knife.

Maybe they've never truly known each other. Maybe they're only connected to each other by Kira, who's gone now. But Athrun recognizes that look, to have loved and lost. He sees it every day in the mirror.

Athrun moves the flame closer. Cagalli ducks her head down. For the smallest fraction of a second, her smooth lower lip brushes his thumb. The touch races through him like a static current, hot and burning.

Clearly, it's been too long since he's been with a woman.

Athrun takes a step back to lean against his desk and coughs embarrassedly. Cagalli takes a deep draw from the cigarette, shoulders relaxing visibly. Athrun tries not to concentrate on the shape of her mouth and how it would feel against his skin.

He waits for her to exhale, in a small wisp of smoke that curls around in the space between them. "You know I can't help you, Cagalli," Athrun says. Her name sounds foreign on his tongue. "The shooting tonight is police business, and Kira's case is being handled by the Criminal Division here at the Agency. It's confidential, and besides, I'm in National Security."

Cagalli taps her cigarette on the rim of her empty Styrofoam cup, the ash falling away from the end. "I actually didn't come to you as an intelligence officer, Athrun." She pauses. "The family estate was supposed to be safe until all of this was…settled. I suppose I didn't want to abandon that place. It felt wrong. And cowardly."

"I'm not sure that this will ever be settled," Athrun interjects. "Not until you all can come to some sort of compromise that allows you to return to the government. It's a venture with which, unfortunately, no one else can help you."

"Yes, well," Cagalli inhales from the cigarette again, "As evidenced by tonight's shooting, it seems that I am the only person in favor of an equal power-sharing settlement." Her coat has edged open to reveal a silk skirt in a pale color that's somewhere between white and cream. It's pretty, and Athrun has the impulsive desire to smooth it over her thighs.

"I need a place to hide," Cagalli tells him candidly. "For a few days. Just until I can figure out what to do next."

Athrun rubs the back of his neck. Cagalli has come to him for help and he knows he's not giving her the answers she wants. He knows she wishes he were Kira.

Athrun wonders what Kira would do if he were in his place, Cagalli sitting before him, asking him to hide her from people who want her dead. He'd probably take her into his arms and swear to stay by her side until she was safe and then a bit longer. Until they had taken vengeance on the Seirans.

But then Kira wouldn't want to run his hands up her legs under her skirt, or tease his fingers past her neck, or press his thumb against her round bottom lip over and over again.

He takes in the dark streak of blood on the sleeve of her coat and knows he can't turn her out. He won't. She had come this close to being killed tonight. And he's not about to lose anybody else.

"I have a guest room in my apartment that you can stay in if you'd like," Athrun offers at last. There's also a five-star hotel across the street from his building, one that he could station some of his men close to. But he'd rather she stay with him. "No one would expect to search for you there."

Cagalli's eyes shine as he says this. The relief in her voice and posture is palpable. "I didn't have anyone else to go to," she whispers. "But I remembered that Kira always held you in the highest regard."

Athrun is taken aback. "You talked about me with Kira?"

She smiles faintly and stands up, skirt straightening around her knees. "My brother and I tell each other everything. I always thought you were a bad influence on him—Kira gathered inspiration from you. He wanted to be able to escape his political duties as you did and 'live life for himself', like some renegade. It was a ridiculous notion, even if Father supported it."

Athrun nicks the cigarette from her slack fingers, taking a short pull himself before stubbing it in the empty cup. "It takes a certain kind of person to thrive in politics as you do," he says, trying and failing to keep his tone light.

Cagalli presses her lips together pensively. "You're right, of course." There is a beat. Cagalli runs her eyes over his face, as if mapping its every plane. "There is another reason I came to you, Athrun. I…I have reason to suspect that Kira may be in PLANT."

From outside the door, Athrun can hear the clicking of shoes, the ringing of phones; the muffled drone of the copy machine. But in here there is nothing but them, the warmth of her skin, his thundering pulse, and that statement, hanging in the air between them.

Athrun exhales deeply. Cagalli waits for his response, and she appears almost hopeful. All at once Athrun feels a surge of emotion toward her, that she has been able to keep herself together for so long without falling to pieces. "All right. All right, Cagalli. We can try to find him."

"You'll help me?" she murmurs.

There is an unnamable feeling in his chest that threatens to surface in the confession, _I'd stay with you forever if I could_, but the thought is laughably sentimental and inappropriate. Instead, he nods briefly.

They don't speak further until they are outside, Athrun holding the passenger door of his car open for her. Cagalli hesitates before stepping in. Her hand, smooth and soft, rests on top of his. In the darkness, her hair burns like firelight and she comes alive.

"Athrun, I hope you understand something."

"Yes?"

"I am stronger than I look."

Athrun grips the doorframe harder. "I know you are. I think you can do anything."

Cagalli bites her lip. "Back then, you were evading my question about Ichiro. You should have told me the truth. You were trying to spare me. But it was cruel."

"I'm sorry."

She squeezes his hand tightly, the touch electric and hot-cold at once. Their eyes meet. It's time-stopping.


	2. Chapter 2

It is almost midnight when the door to the apartment opens and closes, the click of the electronic lock sharp through the dark. There is a barely-audible shuffle in the hallway; the pressure of footsteps toward the sitting room.

Athrun's form comes to stand in front of the armchair on which Cagalli is curled into herself. His face is partially illuminated by the faint moonlight from the large window through which he stares: jaw, nose, cheekbones all sharp angles in the semi-darkness.

There is a weighty silence in the small space between them. There linger all the disappointments and frustrations and quelled hopes of the past two months—the lack of success in tracing Kira, the unresolved stalemate over power between the royal families, the persistent threats to Cagalli's life—pressing down on them from all sides like a heavy blanket, suffocating. Cagalli's continued residence in Athrun's apartment goes unaddressed by either of them. What was intended as a short-term safe house has morphed into a more permanent, unspoken arrangement. Though she'd hardly confess it openly, being close to him makes Cagalli feel safest. She is constantly drawn to him, to his ambiguity and his conscientiousness, like a light draws a moth. His presence warms her from the inside out so her heart flutters against her ribcage.

The frown marring the shape of Athrun's mouth is prominent.

_Such is the winter of our discontent_, Cagalli thinks, calling on a line from a play about a profoundly unhappy world. She shifts out of her curled position to sit up, bare feet brushing the cool hardwood of the floor.

Athrun moves away without looking at her, frown deepening. He drops his hands to the windowsill. His fingers tighten into white apostrophes around its edge. "You're not asleep?" he says at last, voice rough at the edges.

"I was waiting for you."

"You shouldn't have," tersely. When he turns his head, the green of his eyes is obscured.

Automatically, Cagalli folds her body closer to make space for Athrun beside her, even though the armchair isn't nearly big enough for both of them. There is a pause when she thinks that he won't come, that he doesn't want her. But then he approaches and lets himself fall next to her with a heavy sigh. All at once they're pressed incredibly close together, a tangled crush of limbs and pounding pulses. Cagalli's entire left side burns from the heat of him.

"Today's the day my mother died," he murmurs, so lowly that she nearly misses it. The admission seems to surprise him, as if he hadn't exactly meant to speak it. He still hasn't met her eyes. When Cagalli doesn't respond for a long time, he lowers his head into his hands.

Something inside Cagalli hurts strongly, like her heart grows thorns. He hadn't told her. The idea that he has been alone on such a terrible day chokes her. When their father had been killed, she and Kira had been inseparable—right until the day that her brother disappeared. By then, the pain was manageable. But even now, she finds that she's dreading the anniversary of her father's death…and she is outright petrified of May eighteenth. Of a birthday without Kira.

Cagalli winds her arms around Athrun and draws him near. He rests his head in the crook between her shoulder and neck, shoulders pushing into her collarbone. Their proximity should feel strange and uncomfortable, but for some reason it doesn't. It feels right.

His breathing steadies as she cards her fingers through his hair. "I don't like it here," he whispers onto her skin. "It's not home. But there isn't any way for me to go back now."

"Shhh," Cagalli soothes, even though her insides are confused and chaotic. "It's going to be all right." Then, "I'm here."

When Athrun kisses her, it is like waking up from an endless sleep or catching a breath after an underwater dive. It undoes her from the inside so she's trembling from where his hand cups her chin to where her bare ankle grazes his shin. It is like tasting ambrosia on his mouth, like dying and being reborn in a burst of stars.

For the first time that night, Athrun's eyes meet hers. It's like an explosion. Cagalli thinks the world drops out from under their feet.


End file.
